It is no secret that many diseases in both adults and children are closely related to psychological aspects. And without eliminating the root cause, the prerequisites that formed the basis of the disease, it is quite difficult to cure a person. To identify the hidden psychological factors of the disease and to help a child who has health problems, there is such a method as art therapy. We will talk about what it is and whether it is effective in this article.
What it is?
Art therapy includes many methods of influencing the psyche and emotional sphere of the child with art, creativity, creation of beauty. Art therapy classes are widely used by child psychologists, psychotherapists, psychiatrists, as well as social educators and rehabilitation therapists.
Through clear and simple actions that make up the essence of the method - drawing, dancing, music, modeling, etc. - the child can open the hidden corners of his soul, express anxiety and excitement, which cannot always be expressed in words due to age or other factors.
Exercises of art therapy are widely used in diagnostics: a psychologist or psychotherapist, based on the results of children's creativity, may well establish the reasons for his anxiety and even diseases. Art therapy is quite successfully used in the treatment and correction of emotional disorders, neurasthenia, post-stress disorders, personality disorders of a child, and some mental illnesses.
Exciting classes help social educators in the rehabilitation of difficult adolescents, children in difficult life circumstances. Educators use exercises and some methods of this type of therapy in classes with preschool children, as they contribute to a more harmonious development of the personality. Art therapy is quite effective in the rehabilitation of disabled children. The results of such “treatment”, which children go to with great pleasure and enthusiasm, sometimes exceed the results of traditional drug and physiotherapy methods of therapy.
The mainstream medicine has long accepted and recognized these methods, so art therapy is often included in the overall combined course of treatment. The accessibility and simplicity of the methods give parents additional opportunities: even if there is not a single art therapist in the entire settlement, moms and dads may well master the basic methods and types of art therapy on their own and deal with the child at home.
Art patience has a rich past. The first term was invented by the artist Adrian Hill, it happened in 1938. He successfully applied some methods and methods when working with patients at the TB center. Then the techniques were adopted by American psychologists. They were mainly used for the rehabilitation of children with disabilities (disabilities).
The most amazing results were achieved in working with children and adolescents who were taken out of the Nazi concentration camps during the Second World War. The world's first professional Association of Art Therapists was established in the USA in 1960.
Indications
Art therapy is recommended for a wide range of children and adolescents of various age categories. There are no contraindications to it, so anyone can do it, such therapy is not capable of harming the psyche and health of the little patient.
But the primary methods and types of treatment by art are recommended:
- children who demonstrate difficulties in expressing feelings and emotions (capricious, hysterical, withdrawn and shy children);
- children who have experienced severe stress;
- children with depression:
- emotionally unstable guys;
- foster children who may feel a sense of their own "uselessness", rejection by the world;
- children and adolescents who are in a state of conflict with parents and peers;
- children in whose families an unfavorable and psychologically unfavorable environment reigns, as well as children from single-parent families;
- children suffering from various phobias;
- children with autism;
- children with disabilities from birth (cerebral palsy, etc.);
- children who have become disabled as a result of illness or injury at a conscious age;
- children with low self-esteem;
- children with disorders of the central nervous system, with delayed speech and psychomotor development);
- anxious and hyperactive guys.
You can do it from a very young age, some methods are even suitable for children under one year old. Parents can also benefit from the classes, as the basic methods are also effective for adults. Therefore, joint classes are only welcome.
Kinds
The art, from which the method of treatment takes its name, is multifaceted, therefore there are many types of treatment with art. The main methods are as follows.
- Isotherapy (painting treatment) - is widely used to diagnose psychological trauma in a child, the difficulties of adolescence, in shy and secretive children.
- Bibliotherapy (book treatment) - the most famous subspecies of this method is fairy tale therapy, used for children of primary preschool and school age.
- Music therapy (music therapy) - a method that is rarely used for diagnostic purposes, but it is widely and quite successfully used to relieve increased anxiety, emancipation and relaxation. It is often used to correct the psychological state of children and adolescents with visual impairments.
- Drama therapy (treatment by initiation into theatrical performance) - the method shows itself well in working with anxious and overly emotional boys and girls.
- Puppet therapy (puppet theater treatment) - the method is designed specifically for classes with children who have speech disorders, autism spectrum disorders, post-stress disorders.
- Dance therapy (dance exposure) - treatment, which has proven itself well in solving the problems of squeezed and secretive children, children suffering from mental retardation (mental retardation).
- Sand therapy (manipulation of sand and small figures) - the method of analytical psychotherapy. It is also used in traditional psychiatry to diagnose certain perception disorders. Such lessons are especially effective for autistic children and toddlers who have experienced serious psychological trauma and violence.
- Clay therapy (modeling treatment) - This method is a kind of isotherapy, but it has a number of advantages: during sculpting, the nerve endings on the pads of the fingers and palms are stimulated. This is what gives positive results in the correction of conditions in children with disorders of the central nervous system, with impaired vision, hearing, with enuresis and other pathologies.
Today, the accompanying types of art therapy are becoming popular, which appear as the natural development of technology. So, in recent years, phototherapy is gaining momentum - a method that is used for adolescent children, especially for the so-called "difficult" children.
By creating photographs, choosing angles and composition of the frame, children open up, become more understandable for an adult (parent, psychologist). Understanding the motives and problems of a particular little man allows an adult to find the only true "key" to the child's behavior and actions.
Objectives
Only at the first glance of a skeptical adult, drawing or modeling from clay does not solve the main problem of a child if he has an incurable disease or becomes a victim of psychological abuse. In fact, the processes that occur during an art therapy lesson, although they are invisible visually, are of great importance for the rehabilitation of a child.
First of all, art therapy allows the child to throw out all negative internal emotions, which often become the cause of illness (fear, anger, irritation, intolerance, rejection of the world around him). After transferring these emotions to a sheet of paper, a piece of clay, into a dance-motor activity or in a photograph, the child feels relief, and a specialist psychologist or psychosomat is able to identify anxiety factors, problems and troubles of a little man in order to find a way to solve them.
Official sources of encyclopedic properties explain the effect of art therapy by the process of sublimation - it is the transfer of the contents of the inner world outward that allows the child to free himself from the negativity or horror that has settled in him and begin to perceive the world differently.
As an auxiliary technique, art therapy has proven itself well in the medical practice of psychiatrists and psychotherapists. Teaching a child to draw or dance allows an adult to quickly establish contact with even the most uncommunicative and withdrawn child.
It has been proven that even one course of art therapy increases children's self-esteem, develops self-control in a child, instills a good habit of analyzing and realizing their own feelings and emotions, and also develops creative abilities, which, as you know, absolutely every person on Earth has.
Characteristics of species - how to deal?
Certain types of art therapy require a separate explanation, as many parents would like to try such activities with their children. Let's take a closer look at some of the types.
Isotherapy
There are no children in the world who would not like to draw, and therefore this particular method is considered the most accessible and widespread. The method is passive and active. In the first case, parents will have to take the child to an art gallery or show reproductions of famous paintings at home, telling what is depicted on them, why and how. It is imperative to discuss the picture with the child, to give oral characteristics to the characters and the plot.
Passive isotherapy is not suitable for very young children who are not yet able to formulate thoughts, as well as for children who have difficulty identifying visual images (visually impaired and blind). This method is unlikely to be interesting for adolescents.
Active isotherapy is the painting process itself. This involves several techniques. For a child of any age, the so-called projective isotherapy is suitable, in which you can afford to transfer your dreams, goals, plans, fears and discomfort to paper. Tasks for such drawings can be any, as long as the child in the course of drawing could imagine the situation in relation to himself: "I am in the future", "How I spent the day", etc.
Personal isotherapy allows you to work mainly with children of primary school age and older. The point is to allow the child to put their stress into the drawing, thereby freeing themselves of it. To do this, the task is to create a drawing on a free theme. Unlimited by theme, the student will immediately begin to portray exactly what excites him the most.
For children who have experienced stress, fears, you can use the "Draw your horror" technique. Actually, this is the theme of the picture. Do not be surprised that a child uses black and red colors, sharp corners, and incomprehensible shapes. The more aggressive the drawing, the better.
There is a category of children and adolescents who do not want to draw. Special anti-stress coloring pages have been specially created for them. A large number of small details that need to be painted will help you calm down, focus, and relax.
If a mother decides to engage in isotherapy with a child, it should be understood that each pictorial "masterpiece" must be discussed with a son or daughter, try to make the child tell what and why is depicted, how he personally relates to what he depicted. To help beginners, we can recommend reading a book by E. Svistunova "Colorful childhood" or a book by Armine Voronova "Art therapy for children and their parents."
Bibliotherapy
Word treatment shows excellent results for children of different ages. In psychotherapy, fables, fairy tales and stories are most often used. With regard to children, fairy tale therapy is more popular. Listening to a fairy tale or fable, the kid can associate himself with one or another hero of the story. He gets a rare opportunity to experience a variety of fears, go through various trials without going through them in reality. The child will experience all stressful situations in his imagination.
Book treatment is very useful for children with mental and speech retardation. It enriches their ideas about the world, stimulates intellectual abilities, allows them to find their place in society, and also gives an idea of ways to get out of difficult situations, following the example of their favorite heroes.
This method is suitable for children of younger, preschool and primary school ages. For adolescents, there are more complex techniques - analysis and discussion of serious literary works of larger forms.
Parents who would like to practice fairy tale therapy should pay attention to Russian folk tales with simple and understandable plots. It is also recommended to read the manual of a group of authors Prokhorov, Rubanova and Otradnova "The healing power of a fairy tale - fairy tale therapy for adults and children."
Music therapy
Everyone knows about the wonderful properties of good music. Some mothers include classical music not only for their young children, but also for their unborn babies during pregnancy. Indeed, it is difficult to overestimate the harmonious effect of sounds on the human cerebral cortex.
Active music therapy is available for children of preschool and school age. For babies - mostly receptive music therapy. The method of listening to musical compositions is called receptive, and the method of independent playing musical instruments is called active.
For passive listening, classical melodies are suitable, most often music by Bach, Mozart, Vivaldi is used in psychotherapy. It is saturated with emotions and allows the child to associate his own feelings with sounds and harmony (sadness, joy, expectation of something).
For teenagers and middle school students, you can use special musical compositions for relaxation and meditation.
Mom can practice music therapy at home as a companion method for drawing, modeling, dancing. Quiet and unobtrusive music can be played almost constantly - during joint cleaning with a child, while cooking.
Passive listening to music has been shown to reduce emotional stress, relax and relieve stress. Active music-making awakens creativity, increases communication skills, learning ability. So, children who attend a music school are more successful in mathematics and drawing, in geometry and learning foreign languages.
For the correction of special conditions and individual diseases, there are dedicated varieties of music therapy. To learn more about them, you can read the following books: "Music therapy for stuttering" (S. Mashura, Z. Mateyova), "Music therapy for children" (Methodological manual), "Fundamentals of music therapy and genius" (A. Roshchin), " Music therapy for children with autism ”(D. Alvin).
Puppet therapy
Two prominent child psychologists I. Medvedev and T. Shishova have developed a unique method of influencing the child's psyche through puppet shows. This method helps well in resolving conflicts and treating phobias.
The adult's task is to act out a small impromptu performance on the theme of an incident or situation that traumatized the child. The main role will be a doll or stuffed toy, which the baby fully trusts and which is his favorite toy. What kind of dolls mom wants to use for home performances does not really matter - puppets, finger puppets, mitten dolls, as well as the most ordinary dolls and toys will do.
What gives a child such a performance? It relieves stress, allows the baby to look at his problem or fear from the outside. Mom can come up with any ending stories, thereby suggesting a way out for the child from a difficult situation for him. In addition, the puppet show develops, teaches and educates.
If the parents' imagination is not so rich as to come up with and act out a story, and the action will require both voice imitation and certain acting abilities, you can use the experience outlined in the following books: “Children, dolls and we - a guide to puppet therapy” (Irina Shishova, Tatiana Medvedev), "Fundamentals of Puppet Therapy" (L. Grebenshchikova).
Sand therapy
This is a very interesting method that will allow the child to better understand himself, calm down and tune in to recovery and overcoming various life difficulties. Homework will require certain expenses - to purchase a sand therapy kit, but if you wish, you can make it yourself. The set is a tray, the bottom and inner sides of which are painted blue. The dimensions of the tray are 50X70X8 cm. You will need peeled yellow or white sand, water and a lot of different little things - from buttons to small figures, shells, pebbles.
No skill required. A child and teenager will surely enjoy creating sand compositions, finger drawings, building mini-castles using small figures and shells. This activity is simple and interesting for both adults and kids.
What does such an occupation give? The answer is simple - the child can express in the composition all internal conflicts and experiences, fears, stress, fears, expectations. If the child is small, the mother definitely needs to work with him, make sure that the child does not gorge on sand, does not swallow or inhale a small shell, but it is strictly forbidden to impose on the child his vision of the picture of the sandy world. Better often ask why this item was put there by the child, and this one here.
We recommend to read in advance: "Magic in the Sandbox" (E. Konanykhina), "Playing with Sand" (Tatiana Zinkevich-Evstigneeva).
Clay therapy
Not plasticine, not kinetic sand, but clay has the greatest therapeutic and prophylactic effect. Art therapy classes in clay modeling can be done at home using special sets for creativity. The clay is warm and pleasant to the touch, it improves blood circulation in the fingers, the molding process from it is a pleasure for both adults and children.
In addition to the development of motor skills, clay therapy can help children with delayed speech development, difficulties in expressing emotions, and children with problematic behavior. Such activities are very useful for children with cerebral palsy and other forms of paralysis and cuts, because nerve endings and the cerebral cortex are stimulated.
The child should be engaged in under the supervision of adults, who, in turn, will be helped by the book "Clay with character" (A. Lelchuk).
Conclusions
It is not necessary to choose one method, many of them go well with each other: you can sculpt to music, dance to music, paint and at the same time listen to your mother's healing fairy tale. How to combine classes is up to parents to decide.
It should be noted that homework is good for prevention, for relieving daily stress and fatigue. If problems or diseases arise for no apparent reason, it is still better to visit a specialist - a pediatrician and a child psychologist. If a child needs art therapy correction, a specialist will give individual recommendations and tell you which methods to use to solve a specific problem.
Today, art treatment is more than affordable. Many schools and kindergartens employ their own art therapist or psychologist with the appropriate knowledge and experience. If there is such a specialist, do not neglect his advice, if possible, let the child visit him.
Art therapy is an auxiliary method. Do not think that only with the help of painting or music can serious diseases be cured. You should not refuse treatment in favor of art therapy. It is best to combine them skillfully - the result will be excellent.
All the secrets of art therapy for children, see the next video.
